Click here to EnlargeThe Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leaders may not admit but the party has done its caste calculations pretty well, ahead of the Lok Sabha elections.

And so, Amit Shah has a new job in hand - to reach out to the OBCs of Uttar Pradesh. The BJP general secretary in-charge of the state has been tasked by Narendra Modi to organise more than 200 Samajik Nyaya Sammelans till March 15, besides street meetings at the scheduled caste-dominated localities. And through these sammelans the BJP will remind the OBCs that Modi, the party's prime ministerial candidate, is one of them.

Wooing OBCs

BJP national secretary Rameshwar Chaurasia met Dandi Swamis on Sunday and sought their blessings for Narendra Modi.While the party wants to strengthen the bulwark of its support base across the castes, party national president Rajnath Singh is leaving no stone unturned to remind the electorate of Modi's humble beginnings as a tea seller and as someone from the backward caste.

Singh is doing his best to ensure that the Dalits and Kurmis vote for the BJP. With that in his mind, he has got the Udit Raj-led Indian Justice Party (IJP) merge with the BJP. Singh is also trying to bring the Anupriya Patel led-Apna Dal (AD) under BJP's umbrella. While IJP has some influence among the Dalits and poses a threat to the Mayawatiled Bahujan Samaj Party in central UP, AD has its hold over the backward Kurmi caste in eastern part of the state. "BJP has turned soft on the Dalits. So I will ask them to vote for Modi," Raj said. "Talk is on for an alliance. I had recently met the BJP chief. But there are many issues to be resolved," said Patel.

BJP sources told Mail Today that they have been instructed by the central leadership to form 15 election committees. "Each committee will comprise over two dozen members. We have to choose at least one locally well-known member from each caste for the panels," a BJP leader said.

Interestingly, on his part, Modi is reaching out to the Brahmins of the state. His speeches at the Vijay Shankhnad rallies are laden with Hindu symbols and slogans to attract the Brahmin community. It is the same strategy that other leaders are following.

Rameshwar Chaurasia, BJP's national secretary and UP co-in-charge offered food to over 50 Dandi Swamis at a function in Varanasi on Sunday and sought their blessings for Modi.

Dandi Swamis are the wandering Hindu monks of Brahminical order and they can be important campaigners for the BJP as a large number of upper caste Hindus seek guidance from these ascetics.

Holy help

Vishwa Hindu Parishad leader Ashok Singhal has also held a series of meetings with the sadhus of Ayodhya and sought their help to ensure Modi's victory in the elections in the interest of the Hindu community. Chaurasia, however, denied that the party is targeting any caste to garner votes.

"We are not targeting castes. The fact is that the voters want to rise above castes and religion to make Modi the PM of the country," he told MAIL TODAY.

Mulayam revisits Backward route

SP chief Mulayam Singh Yadav being honoured during Prabuddha Sammelan on Saturday.Erosion of public goodwill toward his party has forced Mulayam Singh Yadav to resort to caste and identity-based politics as the SP supremo is making last-ditch efforts to win over the backward and most backward communities in this election year.

Gains made by the Samajwadi Party in the 2012 Uttar Pradesh Assembly polls, when it won 224 seats in the 403-member House, were frittered away in the last few years. Riots, corruption and poor law and order have left the people both disappointed and polarised in the state.

Now, the party is even wooing the upper castes Hindus - Brahmins - in the run up to the 2014 general elections. Mulayam has admitted in meetings that he nominated a Brahmin, Ashok Bajpai, for the Lucknow Parliamentary seat because former PM Atal Bihari Vajpayee, a Brahmin, had represented it five times.

Addressing a Brahmin convention at the party headquarters on Saturday, Mulayam claimed he had learnt many things from the community. "You have shown light to India during crisis. My head will always bow before you even if you don't support me...But I want to warn you against Narendra Modi, who is dreaming to become the PM of the country. He believes in the politics of division," he said.

Mulayam has assigned mining minister Gayatri Prasad Prajapati to take out a "Samajik Nyaya Adhikar Rath Yatra" to spread the message among 17 most backward castes that his party will give them the Scheduled Caste status if it comes to power at the Centre. Rajbhar, Nishad, Bind, Manjhi, Mallah, Kahar, Kashyap, Dhimar, Prajapati, Dheevar, Kewat, Batham, Bhar, Turah, Machhua, Banjara and Gaur form the MBCs.

Interestingly, Mulayam is said to be not sure about the backing from his own community - the Yadavs. The SP chief fears that Ghosis (a Yadav sub-caste) is annoyed with him because a majority of the beneficiaries in the SP government belong to his own Kamariya sub-caste.

So, he had held a meeting at Ghosi dominated Takha area of Etawah district on Sunday and announced development works worth `288 crore. Mulayam has assigned at least one leader of every caste to woo their voter base. On Sunday, the SP supremo was himself busy in flagging off a party sponsored Rath Yatra of the trader community - majority of whom are either Sindhis or Vaishyas. While Vidhan Sabha Speaker Mata Prasad Pandey is holding the meetings of Brahmins in eastern UP, minister of state for religious affairs Manoj Pandey is campaigning in central UP. Social Welfare Minister Awadhesh Prasad has been assigned to win over the Dhobi caste. Prasad had on Sunday held a meeting with the people from the community in Lucknow on the birth anniversary of Gadgeji Maharaj, a saint revered by the community.

Maya has hers but Congress lost

It was in 1991, when BSP founder Kanshi Ram was contesting the Lok Sabha bypolls from Etawah with the active support of Samajwadi Party president Mulayam Singh Yadav. While doing door-todoor campaign, Kanshi Ram knocked at the door of Satya Dev Tripathi, a young Congress leader and sought his support. "What's your ideology?" the Congress leader asked him angrily.BSP supremo Mayawati with party members during the Brahmin Samaj Bhaichara Sammelan in Lucknow on Sunday.

Kanshi Ram, who always used to have a pen in his shirt's pocket, picked it up, held it vertically in his left hand, pointed towards its upper end and answered, "You are hear on the top at the moment." Then he turned the pen upside down and showed its lowest point and said, "I want to push you there."

And Kanshi Ram really did this in UP. While the rival parties are eager to woo all the castes in the Lok Sabha elections and fear that the Aam Admi Party (AAP) could sneak into their vote bank, Kanshi Ram's disciple and BSP supremo Mayawati is sitting comfortable because her scheduled caste vote bank is intact. Even her rivals claim that her tally is not going to slide. Currently, she has 21 Lok Sabha seats.

The Congress, which once used to be a natural choice of the scheduled castes, is going to the Lok Sabha elections without any caste in its basket. Tripathi, the leader to whom Kanshi Ram had explained his ideology with the help of a pen, is now chairman of the communication cell of the UP Congress committee.

"Modi may be attracting crowds in his rallies but, the people of UP will not vote for him. The situation was almost the same in 2009 when we had won 21 Lok Sabha seats out of 80 in UP. The voters will judge us wisely and support us in this election as well," he claimed.